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1.1.0 Infantry Blog


Jalinth

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I just noticed the new blog. Goes into some details about the infantry. This patch will only add light infanty, but they look like they could be VERY interesting. The screenshots look most promising. I for one, can't wait!

http://www.battlefront-newsletter.com/Blogfront/tabid/55/EntryID/21/Default.aspx

Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, 'ow's yer soul?"

But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll,

The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll,

O it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll.

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Sounds good to me too.

One thing I noticed tho, which makes it less realistic I suppose. By reading the description of concealing your infantry it seems the engine makes it impossible to see them after certain distances. That sounds rather artificial. I might be wrong, but if it's handled in that way then I'm not very impressed.

I would prefer for infantry to blend in into the foliage by using camouflage colours. So spotting them is very hard , but if you succeed in spotting one then your effort/skill should be rewarded. Right now it seems that you are unable to spot them as long as they stay at certain distances. It will lead to seeing nothing all the time and suddenly they pop-up out of the "fog of war" just as if they were dropped there.

Maybe the devs can shed some light on this issue smile.gif

Monk.

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Foliage is optional. So is varying levels of terrain detail - for some, infantry would become obvious swimming pixels in the distance and pure ion food.

I don't quite like the idea either, but I can understand where it comes from.

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The new infantry squads look like a great start. Just a few comments:

1) Why no camouflage? Metal armor could be painted quickly for any environment.

2) Why such a short range for the AT grenades? A M-203 can reach out effectively to 300 meters, especially in the hands of an practised gunner.

3) Light infantry should have some form of scout-sniper team capabilty, especially with something like a 20mm anti-personnel, anti-material rifle.

4) Infantry should be able to mark targets for other platforms.

Just some suggestions.

Semper Fi

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Originally posted by LtCol West:

2) Why such a short range for the AT grenades? A M-203 can reach out effectively to 300 meters, especially in the hands of an practised gunner.

While I doubt we should be comparing "AT grenades" to modern day 40mm's, 300 meters is a very short range by the game's scaling.
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One thing I noticed tho, which makes it less realistic I suppose. By reading the description of concealing your infantry it seems the engine makes it impossible to see them after certain distances. That sounds rather artificial. I might be wrong, but if it's handled in that way then I'm not very impressed.
The fundamental problem here is the display technology for the computers we're playing on, Monk. If we all had display resolutions that were an order of magnitude higher than what they are right now then we wouldn't have to do things like this. As it is right now, looking at a distance of several kilometers the human eye is able to distinguish the shapes of things like armored vehicles but on our low-res computer displays such an object is smaller than a single pixel so you can't see it. Therefore, objects in simulations like DropTeam are modelled at an increased scale just so that you can have engagements at realistic ranges.

This extra scaling is a good thing because it makes distant objects visible as they should be, but for small objects such as infantry it gives an unfair advantage to the observer. The only tactic available to infantry when fighting AFV's is to remain unseen until that climactic moment when you're close enough (or in the right position with longer ranged weapons) to expose yourself by firing on the AFV. If we allowed observers to see the infantry at a longer range than they really would be able to see them then this advantage would be negated and infantry would be nearly useless.

All we're doing is making things visible at the actual range that they should be visible. There's nothing incorrect about that.

Why no camouflage? Metal armor could be painted quickly for any environment.
Working on it. It's purely a matter of artistic resources to throw at the problem. It will be there eventually.

Why such a short range for the AT grenades? A M-203 can reach out effectively to 300 meters, especially in the hands of an practised gunner.
DropTeam's AT grenades have an effective range of 300 meters (this is the max distance the AI will attempt to use them at). They can actually fly farther than that depending on the scenario's gravity, but hitting anything would be very difficult.

Light infantry should have some form of scout-sniper team capabilty, especially with something like a 20mm anti-personnel, anti-material rifle.
Yes, that's a great idea for another squad type.

Infantry should be able to mark targets for other platforms.
Yes, I hope to see this not only for infantry but also for the command track to designate targets for really large orbital weapons, too.
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quote:Light infantry should have some form of scout-sniper team capabilty, especially with something like a 20mm anti-personnel, anti-material rifle.

Yes, that's a great idea for another squad type.

Sounds great. Pairing up sniper teams with antitank missile teams (something like a javelin team) should be a good technique.

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I understand Clay (for a moment I thought I heared myself telling others the same argument about scaling-down in this virtual world, lol).

I also see 2 solutions for the popping-up infantry:

1) just carry them inside the vehicles, seeing that's planned allready

2) mapdesign, if maps have enough concealment and cover then it will be very hard to spot infantry

Really looking forward to the infantry, let's see how it plays before I draw any further premature conclusions ;)

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OK, next round of infantry questions:

-Do they have the capability to emplace mines, especially command detonated mines?

-Can they occupy buildings?

-Can they dig in and camouflage their positions?

-It would seem to me that a futuristic infantry squad would also be able to use some kind of small UAV for R&S and an armed UGV for scouting and to supplement firepower and carry additional ammo, etc... Is this possible?

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